We wish the OPEN community a happy holiday season, and a Happy New Year. We are glad to bring you this update on our activities for the second half of 2018.
Post-secondary education: Ignite scholarship program
We are supporting 89 students through this scholarship program for academic year 2018-19 (we have a few more applicants, status TBD after 1st semester college marks are available). Students are predominantly in college for B.Com., B.Sc., 3 year Polytechnic, or 4-year Engineering degrees. Most students in this program are poor, with average family income of Rs. 8000 per month, and we only admit new students to this program after income verification and house visits. Our expected spend for the 2018-2019 academic year is $14,000.
We are happy to announce that S.Neelavathi, a final year B.Tech. Information Technology student (still in her 8th semester), has already secured a job as software developer with Siemens Ltd, at a salary of INR 5L per year. We hope that the other students in their final year will do as well, but we want to reiterate that we focus overall on providing an opportunity to children, and the success rate of the program needs to be looked at in context of the challenges faced by the children.
We continue to hold coaching classes for students in all years in spoken English and in effective communication. Final year students get coaching in Resume writing, Group Discussion, and in effective Interviewing. We are grateful to acknowledge the funding of these classes by Vignesh Educational Trust, the family charitable foundation of one of our OPEN members.
Results-based education: Supplemental classes by Vidyarambam
We continue working with Vidyarambam Trust to bring their Easy Learning English supplemental program to partner schools in Chennai. 1000 students from 7 schools are being coached in English (classes 6-8) during academic year 2018-19. School administrators see the benefits of the extra coaching that their children get during school inspections - children are vocal and confident when asked to read a passage or do math on the board. Testimonials from the Headmistress, Chennai Primary School, Mullai Nagar, and the Headmistress, Chennai Primary School, Ekkattuthangal, are glowing in praise of Vidyarambam.
Our budget for academic year 2018-19 is $21,100 for 1000 children in 7 Chennai schools, covering English only.
The Easy Learning English coaching pre-post comparisons below show the great improvement in performance of the children from the diagnostic phase to the middle test phase, with an explanation of the grades.
Results-based education: Ashraya libraries, Book of the Month, Arts and Science, Computer clubs
The Ashraya Foundation runs libraries and Science and Arts clubs at 9 schools in rural Karnataka. We support librarian salaries and salaries for Arts and Science teachers at 6 of these schools. The reading program is open to all students in classes 4-8, and the Arts and Science clubs are open to the best 20 students in classes 6-8 from each school. The reading level of all students is monitored, and remedial instructions are provided to the bottom 20% of each batch. The best 20 students are enrolled in a Book of the Month Club, and get to pick the best books and do book reports. The book reports this year were on Shakespeare's Othello, Macbeth, Merchant of Venice, etc.
Ashraya are focusing their intervention on approximately the top 10% and bottom 20% of students. Our budget for academic year 2018-2019 is $8200, and we support 700 children in 6 schools, at an annual cost/student of approx $12.
Ashraya recently introduced computer classes in 6 of their schools, taught by a dedicated computer teacher who carries 3 laptops from school to school. Students learn about the parts of a computer, MS Windows and the file system, the basics of Word Processing, Excel, and Internet Search. 32 sessions are conducted at each school per a lesson plan, and live exams are conducted at mid-year and year-end. Click here for an detailed description of the Computer Club, its objectives, and lesson plan.
Somasundaram school in Savagangai Taluk: Computer classes
Somasundaram School is a small school with 80 children in rural Tamil Nadu, with 5 teachers (including a vocational teacher) coaching classes 1-8. We continue to fund an additional Computers teacher, who teaches the children to explore the file system in Microsoft Windows, to compose basic documents and change font formatting in MS Word, and to make basic formulae in MS Excel. Children are taught to use MS Paint to make rudimentary art.
Ongoing projects
We continue our support of Ganapathy Iyer Girls’ Higher Secondary School, Gopalapuram, Chennai, with tuition scholarships for poor children, and operating expenses for after-school classes (chess, karate) and breakfast/evening snacks. This program benefits 170 children.
The Turning Point Trust aims to keep children of slum dwellers in Rotary Nagar, Chennai, in school. The Trust has proposed a new after-school center for 50 children who have been with the program for a long time. We are evaluating this proposal.
We sponsor 10 children from the Malleswaram Shishu Vihar, Bangalore, with scholarships for school. We are also sponsoring the school education of 7 children, selected by Samridhdhi, an NGO that focuses on educating migrant laborers' children inBangalore.
OPEN key statistics, 2003 - December 2018
The OPEN community has supported over 33,000 students in the past 14 years. A breakdown of grants is shown in the chart above.
OPEN needs you
OPEN has been registered as a non-profit charitable foundation in India and in the U.S. Contributions in both countries are tax-deductible. As always, our ability to fund these projects depends on your generosity.
Please consider investing in India's future. To delay may mean to forget.
Sincerely,
The OPEN Team
2018 H1 Update
Greetings to the OPEN community. We are glad to bring you this update on our activities for the first half of 2018.
Spring Fundraiser: Alex in Wonderland
Our fundraising show in March, performed by Alexander Babu, was a great success. Over 400 people attended the show and supported the education of children in India. We thank Alex for the time and effort that he put into making this event a treat for the senses, and we thank the audience and our long-standing contributors for helping us meet our fundraising goal for the event.
Post-secondary education: Ignite Scholarship Program
We supported 120 students through this scholarship program for academic year 2017-18. Students are predominantly in college for B.Com., B.Sc., 3 year Polytechnic, or 4-year Engineering degrees. Most students in this program are poor, with average family income of Rs. 8000 per month. Our budget for the 2017-2018 academic year was $16,100.
We are glad to announce that 39 of the 46 final year studentshave graduated on time. 20 of these 39 graduates have jobs or have enrolled in higher study programs. Given the poverty of these students, graduating is a major success.
Notable among the success stories are Anjana Jayashri, who was second in her graduating class and missed the top rank by 0.02 CGPA; and Santosh Kumar, both from Sri Venkateswara College of Engineering. Anjana chose a job with Vedanta, paying INR 5.5L per year, and Santosh chose a job with Zilker Technologies, paying INR 6.6L per year. There are other children with more middle of the road jobs. We want to reiterate that we focus overall on providing an opportunity to children and on coaching them on interviewing, life skills etc, and the success rate of the program needs to be looked at in context of the challenges faced by the children.
Scholarship applications from new students have been accepted for the 2018-19 academic year, and home visits have been completed for income verification. Counselling and personal interviews have been scheduled on August 5 to complete student selection.
Results-based education: Supplemental Classes by Vidyarambam
We continue working with Vidyarambam Trust to bring their Easy Learning English and Easy Learning Mathematics supplemental programs to partner schools in Chennai. 1400 students from 8 schools were coached in English (classes 6-8) and Math (classes 1-5) during academic year 2017-2018. Vidyarambam were requested to run their programs for the entire school year, up from the 5 months that they were running their programs previously. School administrators see the benefits of the extra coaching that their children get during school inspections - children are vocal and confident when asked to read a passage or do math on the board. Testimonials from the Headmistress, Chennai Primary School, Mullai Nagar, and the Headmistress, Chennai Primary School, Ekkattuthangal, are glowing in praise of Vidyarambam.
Our budget for the 2017-2018 academic year was $26,100, for 1400 students in 8 Chennai schools, at an annual cost/student of $19 approx. Our budget for academic year 2018-19 is $22,000 for 1050 children in 5 Chennai schools, covering English only.
The Easy Learning English coaching pre-post comparisons below show the great improvement in performance of the children from the diagnostic phase to the final test phase. The vast majority of children progress from C grade (red bar) in the diagnostic pre-test, to A grade (green bar) in the final test.
Results-based education: Ashraya libraries, Arts and Science Clubs
The Ashraya Foundation runs libraries and Science and Arts clubs at 9 schools in rural Karnataka. We support librarian salaries and salaries for Arts and Science teachers at 6 of these schools. The reading program is open to all students in classes 4-8, and the Arts and Science clubs are open to the best 20 students in classes 6-8 from each school. The reading level of all students is monitored, and remedial instructions are provided to the bottom 20% of each batch. The best 20 students are enrolled in a Book of the Month Club, and get to pick the best books and do book reports. The top 20 students at each school participate in the Arts and Science clubs. Ashraya are focusing their intervention on approximately the top 10%, and bottom 20%, of students. Our budget for academic year 2018-2019 is $8200, and we support 800 children in 6 schools, at an annual cost/student of approx $10.
The video snippet below shows Ashraya founder Vasuki Subbarao explaining his thinking behind the solar car race project to OPEN's Sriram Sankaran and Ramprasad Santhanakrishnan, who attended Ashraya's annual day.
Ashraya results show that in 2017-18, 67% of the children improved reading by at least one level over the course of the year. In particular, 77% of the students in the remedial reading program saw improvement in reading. Key Ashraya statistics and comparison between 2017 and 2018 are presented below.
Ongoing Projects
We continue our support of Ganapathy Iyer Girls’ Higher Secondary School, Gopalapuram, Chennai, with tuition scholarships for poor children, and operating expenses for after-school classes (chess, karate) and breakfast/evening snacks. This program benefits 170 children. This school reported 100% pass rate in the 10th standard board exams.
The Turning Point Trust aims to improve life skills for the children of slum dwellers in Rotary Nagar, Chennai. A Children's parliament, personality development classes, and first aid training classes are conducted on weekends to coach children on public speaking, and help is provided to perform homework. We are looking to fund expansion of this program to two centers in order to keep kids in school.
We are sponsoring 10 children from the Malleswaram Shishu Vihar, Bangalore, with scholarships for school. We are funding after-school Math tuition classes for standards 6-8 in 3 schools in Bangalore, in collaboration with the Adarsh Colony CSRFoundation. We continue to fund computer teacher salaries at Somasundaram School in rural Tamil Nadu
OPEN key statistics, 2003 - June 2018
The OPEN community has supported over 30,000 students in the past 14 years. A breakdown of grants is shown in the chart above.
OPEN Needs You
OPEN has been registered as a non-profit charitable foundation in India and in the U.S. Contributions in both countries are tax-deductible. As always, our ability to fund these projects depends on your generosity.
Please consider investing in India's future. To delay may mean to forget.
Sincerely,
The OPEN Team
2017 H2 Update
Greetings to the OPEN community. We are glad to bring you this update on our activities for the second half of 2017.
Post-secondary education: Ignite Scholarship Program
We support 110 students through this scholarship program for academic year 2017-18. Students are predominantly in college for B.Com., B.Sc., 3 year Polytechnic, or 4-year Engineering degrees. Most students in this program are poor, with average family income of Rs. 8000 per month. Our budget for the 2017-2018 academic year is $18,000.
We held career coaching classes for the students at Ganapathy Iyer School in Chennai. The aim is to prepare the students for interviews - by making them practice public speaking and participating in group discussions, and writing professional resumes.
Results-based education: Supplemental Classes by Vidyarambam
We continue working with Vidyarambam Trust to bring their Easy Learning English and Easy Learning Mathematics supplemental programs to 6 partner schools in Chennai. Vidyarambam have now integrated their curriculum with the Samacheer State Board Curriculum and have been requested to run their program for the entire school year, up from the 5 months that they were running their programs previously. Our budget for the 2017-2018 academic year is $27,000, for 1350 students in 8 Chennai schools, at an annual cost/student of $21.
For English testing, Vidyarambam have made their methodology consistent with that of ASER. They now look at ability to recognize letters, words, sentences and paragraphs.
The Easy Learning English coaching pre-post comparisons for 7th standard below show the great improvement in performance of the children from the diagnostic phase to the mid-year test phase for 2017-18. The vast majority of children progress from C grade (red bar) to A and B grades (green and blue bars).
Results-based education: Ashraya libraries, Arts and Science Clubs
The Ashraya Trust runs libraries and Science and Arts clubs at 9 schools in rural Karnataka. We support librarian salaries and salaries for Arts and Science teachers at 5 of these schools. The reading program is open to all students in classes 4-8, and the Arts and Science clubs are open to the best 20 students in classes 6-8 from each school. The reading level of all students is monitored, and remedial instructions are provided to the bottom 20% of each batch. The best 20 students are enrolled in a Book of the Month Club, and get to pick the best books and do book reports. The top 20 students at each school participate in the Arts and Science clubs. Ashraya are focusing their intervention on approximately the top 10%, and bottom 20%, of students. Our budget for academic year 2017-2018 is $7400, and we support 700 children in 5 schools, at an annual cost/student of approx $10.
Infrastructure: Jaigopal Garodia Girls' School, Chennai
Many of you will recall that OPEN's first project was the construction of the noon meal kitchen for Jaigopal Garodia Girls' High School, Saidapet, Chennai. We provided $935 towards repair and renovation of the kitchen.
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Other Ongoing Projects
We continue our support of Ganapathy Iyer Girls’ Higher Secondary School, Gopalapuram, Chennai, with tuition scholarships for poor children, and operating expenses for after-school classes (chess, karate) and breakfast/evening snacks. This program benefits 170 children. This school reported 100% pass rate in the 10th standard board exams.
The Turning Point Trust aims to improve life skills for the children of slum dwellers in Rotary Nagar, Chennai. A Children's parliament, personality development classes, and first aid training classes are conducted on weekends to coach children on public speaking, and help is provided to perform homework. We are looking to fund expansion of this program to two centers in order to keep kids in school.
We are sponsoring 10 children from the Malleswaram Shishu Vihar, Bangalore, with scholarships for school. We are funding after-school Math tuition classes for standards 6-8 in 3 schools in Bangalore, in collaboration with the Adarsh Colony CSRFoundation. We continue to fund computer teacher salaries at Somasundaram School in rural Tamil Nadu.
OPEN key statistics, 2003 - December 2017
The OPEN community has supported over 30,800 students in the past 15 years. A breakdown of grants is shown in the chart above.
OPEN Needs You
OPEN has been registered as a non-profit charitable foundation in India and in the U.S. Contributions in both countries are tax-deductible. As always, our ability to fund these projects depends on your generosity. Please use the year-end opportunity to contribute to the children of India, and save on your taxes. Checks payable to OPEN Inc. may be sent to Kumar or Rajesh at:
Kumar Thiagarajan, 25470 Gimbel Dr, South Riding, VA 20152
Rajesh Ramadoss, 38 Ocean St, Millburn, NJ 07041
Tax-deductible contributions may be sent to Sriram in India in favor of OPEN India Charitable Trust:
Please consider investing in India's future. To delay may mean to forget.
Sincerely,
The OPEN Team
2017 H1 Update
Greetings to the OPEN community. We are glad to bring you this update on our activities for the first half of 2017, and apologize for the delay in sending this update. The delay was due to collecting as much data as we could re: the final statistics for our 2016-17 Ignite scholarship program, with graduation results trickling in well into September.
Spring Fundraiser: Concert by Rasika
Our fundraising concert in late May, played by Rasika, was a great success. Over 800 people attended the show and supported the education of children in India. We thank Rasika for the time and effort that they put into making this concert a treat for the senses, and we thank the audience, our sponsors, and our long-standing contributors for helping us meet our fundraising goal for the concert.
Post-secondary education: Ignite Scholarship Program
We supported 130 students through this scholarship program for academic year 2016-17. Students are predominantly in college for B.Com., B.Sc., 3 year Polytechnic, or 4-year Engineering degrees. Most students in this program are poor, with average family income of Rs. 8000 per month. Our budget for the 2017-2018 academic year is $23,000.
We are glad to announce that 48 of the 57 final year students have graduated on time. 27 of these graduates have jobs or have enrolled in higher study programs. Given the poverty of these students, graduating is a major success.
We are incredibly glad to announce that R.Karthik, who completed a BE (Mech) program from Coimbatore Institute of Technology in 2016, has now been admitted to a Masters program in Metallurgical Engineering from RwthAachen University in Germany. This program is in the top 20 in the world. We are also glad to note that Ms.Krithika has been admitted to an M.Pharm program after shining in her undergraduate degree. These students would not have completed their undergraduate degrees without your support.
Results-based education: Supplemental Classes by Vidyarambam
We continue working with Vidyarambam Trust to bring their Easy Learning English and Easy Learning Mathematics supplemental programs to 6 partner schools in Chennai. Over 1700 students were coached in English (classes 6-8) and Math (classes 1-5) during academic year 2016-2017. We are glad to report that Vidyarambam have now integrated their curriculum with the Samacheer State Board Curriculum and have been requested to run their program for the entire school year, up from the 5 months that they were running their programs previously. Our budget for the 2017-2018 academic year is $26,000, for 1200 students in 9 Chennai schools, at an annual cost/student of $22.
The Easy Learning English coaching pre-post comparisons below show the great improvement in performance of the children from the diagnostic phase to the final test phase for 2016-17. The vast majority of children progress from C grade (red bar) to A grade (green bar).
Results-based education: Ashraya libraries, Arts and Science Clubs
The Ashraya Foundation runs libraries and Science and Arts clubs at 9 schools in rural Karnataka. We support librarian salaries and salaries for Arts and Science teachers at 5 of these schools. The reading program is open to all students in classes 4-8, and the Arts and Science clubs are open to the best 20 students in classes 6-8 from each school. The reading level of all students is monitored, and remedial instructions are provided to the bottom 20% of each batch. The best 20 students are enrolled in a Book of the Month Club, and get to pick the best books and do book reports. The top 20 students at each school participate in the Arts and Science clubs. Ashraya are focusing their intervention on approximately the top 10%, and bottom 20%, of students. Our budget for academic year 2017-2018 is $7000, and we support 700 children in 5 schools, at an annual cost/student of approx $10.
Ashraya results show that at least 40% of the children improved reading by one level over the course of the year. In particular, 65% of the students in the remedial reading program saw improvement in reading.
Rural Education: Single Teacher Schools
We continue funding the Single Teacher program, run by the Swami Vivekananda Rural Development Society, for operating expenses for 5 schools (168 students) in Tiruvallur district in rural Tamil Nadu. One person teaches all children in the school, who study together though they may be in different grades. After completing Class 5, students are expected to continue education at regular schools.
Ongoing Projects
We continue our support of Ganapathy Iyer Girls’ Higher Secondary School, Gopalapuram, Chennai, with tuition scholarships for poor children, and operating expenses for after-school classes (chess, karate) and breakfast/evening snacks. This program benefits 170 children. This school reported 100% pass rate in the 10th standard board exams.
The Turning Point Trust aims to improve life skills for the children of slum dwellers in Rotary Nagar, Chennai. A Children's parliament, personality development classes, and first aid training classes are conducted on weekends to coach children on public speaking, and help is provided to perform homework. We are looking to fund expansion of this program to two centers in order to keep kids in school.
We are sponsoring 10 children from the Malleswaram Shishu Vihar, Bangalore, with scholarships for school. We are funding after-school Math tuition classes for standards 6-8 in 3 schools in Bangalore, in collaboration with the Adarsh Colony CSRFoundation. We continue to fund computer teacher salaries at Somasundaram School in rural Tamil Nadu
OPEN key statistics, 2003 - June 2017
The OPEN community has supported over 27,000 students in the past 13 years. A breakdown of grants is shown in the chart above.
OPEN Needs You
OPEN has been registered as a non-profit charitable foundation in India and in the U.S. Contributions in both countries are tax-deductible. As always, our ability to fund these projects depends on your generosity. Please use the year-end opportunity to contribute to the children of India, and save on your taxes. Checks payable to OPEN Inc. may be sent to Kumar or Rajesh at:
Kumar Thiagarajan, 25470 Gimbel Dr, South Riding, VA 20152
Rajesh Ramadoss, 38 Ocean St, Millburn, NJ 07041
Tax-deductible contributions may be sent to Sriram in India in favor of OPEN India Charitable Trust:
